STOP!

I passed the design by our 5-year-old and he believes there's a major design fault (in the area shown below). He also said that he doubts you'll be able to understand... but that Paul should be able to.

Merry Christmas!

Mani.

510 hp and 600 Nm of torque perhaps?

Nice!

Mani.

For me, this setting takes redbook past MQA!

Mani.

Richard, I had a similar issue. All I did was stick an old Audioquest Dragonfly that I had lying around into one of the USB ports of my server and select that as the sound device in XX. You may then have to do as Ramesh suggests too (I don't recall having to do this myself though).

Do you have an old 24/96-capable USB DAC hanging around? (It doesn't even have to be connected to an amp or anything.)

Mani.

Peter, just delete these links if you think it's too risky to share files...

Here are two files from the same master (see waveforms and spectra below):

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1DkADQPvNQwGhpzy_9fW9jG7UJsuMEUQ2

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1asq0eZed6aiEUB-ULV2jRtDnIHqsr1kD

The music may not be to everyone's tastes, but it should be pretty inoffensive to the ear.

The clarity in the MQA file should be immediately apparent. There should also be a difference in the punchiness of the bass once the track gets going.

There is no question in my mind which one I prefer...

Mani.

PS. Peter, I've got the Yello albums you suggested - I'll take a listen in a short while.

The quote is from an interview Bob gave in May this year at the Munich High End Show (I attended his MQA presentation the day before this interview): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3r_VRxcwODI

I find the interviewer quite frustrating - he keeps on interrupting whenever Bob seems to be getting into interesting stuff. By the sound of his accent the interviewer's Dutch, so we'll forgive him

A few things that Bob said that caught my ear:

“What looks like high frequency on a FFT is actually temporal microstructure in the audio itself.”

“Our hearing is in fact incredibly acutely sensitive to microstructure in the mid-range and to typically quiet sounds.”

“The de-blurring process is like cleaning your window. If the window is dirty and we clean it, that is lossy… because we took the dirt away. But we made it better.”

“The passage of sound through the whole digital chain should be like sound travelling through air.”

Mani.

Cheers Colin.

I thought the whole 'MQA deblurring' thing was just marketing speak. But my ears are telling me that there seems to be something actually to it.

I look forward to hearing more thoughts about the sound of MQA from others...

Mani.

Hey Peter, in one of his interviews, Bob Stuart says:

Some people say, ‘I can do a better filter than MQA’, but I say, well actually, you can’t because the encoder and the decoder together make the perfect match… and it’s not the same on every recording. The filter that’s chosen on a 2L recording will be different from one on a jazz recording.

If so, does this mean that no matter which filter we choose in XX, it can never be optimally matched? Or that if it is, it is totally coincidental?

Just trying to understand why I generally like the sound of MQA played back through XX and the NOS1.

Mani.

Well I have to say that I am thoroughly enjoying exploring MQA-encoded music with the NOS1 at the moment. There tends to be a clarity to the sound that I really like. To my ears it's a bit like comparing AP to AI filtering - AP tends to lose the LF bloom but is simply more accurate-sounding and more life-like.

Guys, it's obvious to me that Peter must have spent a lot of time and effort sorting MQA out for XX. I think we owe it to him to at least try it and give our feedback.

And those with a NOS1 may be pleasantly surprised...

Mani.

Hmm...

I have to say that I really like the sound of the few MQA albums I've tried so far.

I have an MQA and non-MQA version of an album that I'm sure is from the same master. With MQA decoding switched off in XX, the two versions of the album sound very different. The non-MQA version sounds softer and fuller. The MQA version sounds a bit on the thin side in comparison, but 'cleaner' with it. My preference is the MQA version with the MQA decoder in XX switched on.

This was not what I was expecting at all!

Mani.

I upgraded to 2.09 on the music server ('Tidal' PC) before trying anything.

I deleted and re-prepared the MQA albums. Everything works fine. Thanks.

Mani.

I selected another DAC in my music server, and everything seems to be working OK now.

Thanks.

Mani.

The issue is identical on my Phasure audio PC too...

I think I've found the issue:

It seems to be a base rate problem (44.1 vs 48). MQA 44.1 rates work fine (see below), however 48 rates don't. The issue seems to stem from my music server. I get the error shown below when preparing streams.

Mani.

Hey Peter, I'm having a problem decoding MQA. I've only tried a couple of albums from Tidal, and both give the same error (below) just before playback commences.

If I switch off 'decode HDCD + MQA', then everything works fine.

Any ideas?

Mani.

I'll definitely do this when I return from my work travels next week.

Mani.